The heiress of Greenhurst

by Ann S. Stephens

It was the last time that Turner ever tortured me with questions regarding my mother—questions that I had no power to answer, yet which brought with them such mysterious, such indescribable pain. Later, when my soul was called back from the past—but of this hereafter.

CHAPTER XXVI.
THE FAIRY AT THE POOL.

One day I had wandered through the garden and out among the brave old chestnuts quite alone, for now that the family were absent, Turner allowed me to wander almost at will anywhere between the old mansion and our more humble, but not less lovely home.

This time I took one of the great chestnut avenues hitherto unexplored, which led me, by a curving sweep, to the lodge, which I just remembered having passed in my progress from the meadows, on the memorable night when Turner found me upon the door-steps. Then it had seemed like a cliff, adown which great festoons of ivy were sweeping to the ground. Now I saw the thick foliage turned and forced back here and there, to admit light into the doors and windows of a rustic cottage, which had a stir of life within, though I saw no person.

I passed this lodge with a stealthy tread, for a sense of disobedience troubled me, I knew, without having been directly told, that both Turner and Maria would disapprove my passing beyond the limits of the park; but childish curiosity, with some vague remembrance of the place, were too strong for my sense of right, and I passed on quite charmed with the broad slope of meadow land that lay before me, all golden, crimson and white with mid-summer blossoms. A village with a church tower in the distance rose upon my view like a glimpse of fairy land. I felt then that the world, as Turner asserted, was full of people, and longed to know more about them.

I walked along the carriage track which wound toward the village through thick hedges just out of blossom, holding my breath as I recognized here a moss-covered stone, there a hillock, upon which I had set down to rest on that wearisome night. The grass was green and fresh where the tent had been, to which my first remembrance went back, but I recollected the place well. As I stood gazing on it, the soft gurgle of waters fell upon my ear as it had then, and induced, half by a feeling that seemed like terror, half by curiosity, I moved toward the hollow, wondering if I should find that impish little figure waiting for me again.

I reached the slope, looked half timidly down, and remained breathless and lost in delight.

Upon the rock which I have mentioned covered with lichen and mossy grasses, sat a little girl, about my own age, I should think, busy with a quantity of meadow blossoms that filled the crown of a straw bonnet that stood by her side. All around her lay the gathered blossoms; her tiny feet were buried in them; they gleamed through the skirt of her muslin dress, and brightened the rock all around. She coquetted with them like a bird—bending her head on one side as she held a cluster of violets in the sun, flinging it back with a graceful curve of the neck, when they dropped into shadow, and eyeing them coyly all the time, as a robin regards the cherry he intends to appropriate at leisure.

What eyes the creature had! large and of a purplish blue, like the violets she held, and so full of smiling brightness. Never before or since have I seen a creature so beautiful, so full of graceful bloom. Her profuse hair was in disorder, falling in golden waves and curls all over her white shoulders, from which the transparent sleeve was drawn with knots of blue ribbon, leaving the prettiest dimples in the world exposed. Her mouth was soft, red, and smiling like ripe cherries in the sunshine, and that rosy smile, so innocent in its tenderness, so radiant with glee! Talk of women not feeling the glow of each other’s beauty; why, there is no feeling on earth so unselfish, so full of lofty, tender admiration as the love which one high-souled woman feels for the sister woman to whom her soul goes forth in sympathy. This appreciation, these attachments are not frequent in society, but when they do exist, the loves of the angels are almost realized. Sometimes the same feeling extends to children, but not often.

I looked down upon this child, thus busy with her graceful flowers, and my heart filled with the sunshine of her presence. As she trifled with her garlands, the smile broke into music on her red lips, and a few soft chirping notes, wild and untaught as a bird’s, blended richly with the flowing waters.